Read the full story here with some hilarious comments at the end

1) Fobgeneration. It takes 9 seconds from the time you die in Call of Duty until you regenerate. Most people waste that time sitting in a chair getting fatter. You can maximize it for an optimal workout. As soon as death is imminent, shift your weight out of your chair into a sprinters posture and push off. The chair spring will give you the extra lift you need to get up to speed quickly. Sprint to the fridge and slide on one knee as you throw the door open behind you with your non-dominant hand. Simultaneously, reach for a Red Bull with your non-dominant hand and use the whip of your slide to both close the door and pull yourself up. Sprint back. Should you encounter an obstacle be prepared to do a combat roll over it, maintaining the Red Bull in a safe position. Pop up and continue. Hurdle any chairs in your path. As you approach your chair, begin to turn your body 180 degrees so that you slide into your chair while opening your Red Bull. The chair will bounce off the adjoining wall or desk and the recoil will return you to playing position. Gain positive control over your remote control. You just completed one Fobgeneration.

2) Fobsit. Often times when sitting in your office on the FOB the stress gets the better of you and you just need to get in a 4-5 hour nap. A newb Fobbit will get caught by “the man” during this exercise, but a wiley veteran knows the importance of keeping his or head on a swivel and executing a flawless Fobsit. First, ensure you are not facing the door as you place your legs up on the desk and your hand cradles your keg-pack. Next, pretend your boss just came through the door. Flex your ab so your knees fire into your stomach while you throw your hands forward towards the keyboard. Your knees will bounce off your stomach and fall to the ground, forcing your hands forward and into perfect typing position. You’ve just completed one Fobsit.

3) Fobstralian Crawl or Reverse Swim Technique. This technique is similar to the one you may have seen in football. With the fast food restaurants coming back to the FOBs you need to have your game face on and beat the suckers that don’t realize that second Big Mac is first loser. With your near hand, trap the shoulder of the Fobbit in front of you (note, make sure it isn’t a grunt coming out of sector) while your far hand swims in an overhand motion past the shoulder. Next, push off from your food gathering nemesis and propel yourself past him, directly into the calorie bomb you so richly deserve. Mike Charlie my friends. Mike Charlie.

Fobstralian Crawl, part 1

Fobstralian Crawl, part 2

Fobstralian Crawl, part 3

Fobstralian Crawl, part 4

Esther Lin of Strikeforce catches Tim Kennedy seconds after his submission victory

Tim’s practically asleep in the locker room, only an hour before his fight – a spectacular juxtaposition to the intensity that Cyborg Santos has been maintaining for the last two hours next door. Top ranked 145 pounder Brandon Garner, striking coach Jason Webster, UFC Fighter Jared Hamman, and I are passing the time talking about new movies coming out. I honestly believe that the rest of us have more nervous energy than Tim does.

When we’re thirty minutes out, Tim starts to warm up, doing a few rounds with Brandon on the pads and then some pummeling with Jared before deciding he was warm enough. We watched on our closed circuit television as KJ Noons’s hand was raised in his decision victory over Conor Heun. The Strikeforce handler arrived at our door and we were instantly moving.

No matter how many times you walk out to the cage as a corner, it is always surreal. The air is electric, excitement and nervousness fill your stomach, and everything happens faster than it appears on television. The crowd only exacerbates those feelings.

Tim walks through the fighter port, and Brandon, Jason and I walk around through the corner entrance, meeting Tim at the cage door. He strips off his War Eagle Flag shirt and hat and I collect them as Big John McCarthy checks him off and Brandon and Jason raise his banner.

Tim Kennedy is staring across the ring at Trevor Prangley, his toughest challenge to date in an Olympic Wrestler who has never been submitted and has spent the last few months at the world-renowned American Kickboxing Academy. On Tim’s banner, right underneath the Ranger Up emblem sit two giant logos: The Green Beret Foundation and Soldiers’ Angels – two military nonprofits that Tim is proud to support.

Seconds later the fight begins as we are ushered to our corner area.

Tim pushes a frenetic pace, attacking Trevor. Both men connect and Tim has a small scratch above his eye. Brandon, a phenomenal corner, lets him know it is nothing. They lock up and Trevor nails a perfect Harai-Goshi Judo Throw, no doubt mastered under the tutelage of Dave Camarillo. It is a sight to behold. I hold my breath.

Tim is nonplussed. He rolls through, regains his balance and works back to his feet where he gains the clinch and hits Prangley with a great hook and peppers him with dirty boxing against the cage. Prangley, known for his tenacity, uses his Greco/Judo skills again and throws Tim a second time. Tim easily rolls through but this time completes a takedown and gets on top.

As anyone who has ever had the (mis)fortune to roll with Tim knows, once he gets on top, your life is a freaking nightmare. Tim rapidly works through guard to half guard and then to mount, the whole time punishing Prangley.

As expected, Prangley rolls to his stomach and stands up. Against most fighters, and in fact, all of the thirty other men that Prangley had met in the cage in his pro career, his power and wrestling would have saved the day and returned him to his feet.

Tim submitted him for the first time in his career with an incredibly technical rear naked joke from a standing position at just over three minutes of the very first round.

It happened so fast in fact, that we in the corner didn’t realize Prangley had tapped until Tim threw his hands up in joy and we saw that Trevor had slumped to the ground.

The underdog had won and in dominant fashion. Tim’s true fans cheered as he represented us well. The doubters were silenced and nodded newfound approval and respect. And the trolls that like to bash him for his military service…well…they can Derelick my balls.

After years of fighting part-time in between Special Forces training and deployments, all while amassing an 11-2 record, Tim finally had the chance to fight fulltime as a member of the Texas National Guard. In his first outing he dominated a top ranked fighter that most experts believed would destroy him.

I gotta tell you…it was kind of awesome.

Please reach out to Tim in the comments section here, on his facebook page, or write him at tim@rangerup.com. He’d love to hear from you.

Ranger Up is having it’s fourth anniversary today. Thanks to Matty for reminding me of the last four years.

“Nice f*cking plant, Nick”, Matt Phinney let out in his thick South Boston accent.

Phinney, Jorge Rivera’s striking couch and a future MMA phenom, inadvertently just walked into story time with Nick.

“That plant has monumental significance.”

“Oh yeah? How so?”

“Matty you’re about to hear the story of the two major events that finally led me to leave corporate America and do Ranger Up fulltime.”

“Please Nick, tell me more,” he waited, with bated breath.

And so it begins…

Ranger Up started as a hobby for me. When I left the Ranger Training Brigade for Duke University, let’s just say there was a “cultural shift”. Basically, 80% of the people I was now with were spoiled rich kids with entitlement complexes. To prevent a Nick killing spree, I started volunteering to teach the ROTC cadets Army Combatives and small unit tactics. I continued to do this for a while even after graduating. At one point, the cadets started complaining about not having any cool shirts to wear that were pro-military. If you were a commie-loving, tree-hugging, socialist there were hundreds of sites, but if you were a patriotic troop or vet, all you had was skulls and “Death from Above”. My buddy and I said, “How hard can it be?” and Ranger Up was born.

It was really freaking hard. Especially because to pay bills, eat, and get drunk occasionally, I was working at a Fortune 100 company. I wore button down shirts, suits, and shiny leather shoes. I attended meetings…lots and lots of meetings. I did PowerPoint presentations. It was a good company and a good job. The kind of job that makes moms proud. The kind of job young business students want to attain. The kind of job that was going to kill me. I was living in a Dilbert cartoon. I decided Ranger Up would eventually be my only job.

I worked from 8-6 at the corporate job and from 7:30-2:00 AM on Ranger Up. On the weekends, I did Ranger Up. This was my life for two years. We started getting bigger. Tim Kennedy joined the team. Kelly Crigger’s Army Times article hit and we were three times bigger overnight. We moved out of the apartment and into a warehouse. Tommy Batboy came on board and started running the warehouse. Garrett came on fulltime. We moved to a bigger warehouse less than a year after moving into the first one.

In Corporate Land, I had gotten promoted to a kind of big job that was even more meeting-centric. My boss was a great dude with well-planned visions and strategies the senior leadership would never commit to, so he was usually frustrated, which only amplified my annoyance. He would never directly express his annoyance, however, which resulted in a passive-aggressive exchange – a language I do not speak.

My anxiety was growing too. Ranger Up needed me constantly now and every time I had to work on some presentation that I knew would be changed 1000 times and ultimately result in absolutely no action, I wanted to choke someone…so I somehow convinced HR to invest in a 40×40 foot wrestling mat and started a fight club. Yes, I beat up my coworkers on the company dime. Even that did nothing to abate my need to get control of my life.

Enter the Plant

In November, right before I headed out on a weeklong business trip, my boss gave everyone in the group poinsettias for Christmas. When I returned from my trip, I saw that my plant was almost dead. My boss had a rough meeting that morning, where they killed yet another one of his ideas. Apparently, he had come out of the meeting, seen my plant on the verge of collapse, watered it, and then complained to everyone he could see that I didn’t care about the plant and that was a poor way to treat a gift. By the end of the day, everyone in my group, four other groups, the mailroom, and even the checkout lady at the cafeteria let me know that my boss was really hurt by my lack of botanical compassion.

He, however, said nothing to me. I probed. “Anything wrong?” I asked. “Nothing,” he replied. Yet, the rumors of anger continued to grumble and the jackass in me came to the forefront. I researched poinsettias. I bought the proper plant food, watered it on the proper schedule, turned it routinely for improved sunlight. I was a poinsettia growing mother-watch-your-mouth!

Christmas came and went. My poinsettia flourished. It lost its red color. It grew awkwardly high. It was still wrapped in bright red Christmas foil.

My boss asked, “You getting rid of that thing?”

I replied, “Oh no, boss! I am never getting rid of this plant! I loooooove it! I will have it as long as I live. It is the best gift anyone has ever given me.” I returned to work as he walked off with a puzzled look on his face.

Over time, more coworkers asked about it. We were now in the summer months and my plant became even more awkward sitting on my desk.

“When you getting rid of that thing?”

“Never. This plant is my favorite thing in this entire building. When I leave this company I am leaving every possession I have here except this plant. Someday this plant will be a giant bush in front of the Ranger Up compound.”

“Really? It’s just a poinsettia, dude.”

“There are many poinsettias, but this one is mine.”

“What if I steal it? Ahahahahaha!”

“I will kill you.”

“What?”

Silence.

“See you later, Nick.”

The poinsettia became my liberty tree, but my Boston Tea Party was coming.

Over the line, dude. Mark it zero.

It was the Strategic Planning Meeting for the Division. Our Division President, every VP, director, and person of consequence was there…oh yeah, and me. Slide after slide went by. Finally, we arrived at a poorly performing product category that had been the bane of the Division’s profitability. As the appropriate VP started to brief the President let out a scowl.

“Argh! I can’t stand this thing! I don’t want to look at it! I don’t want you to look at it! I don’t even want to show it to my wife!”

“That’s what she said,” is what came out of my mouth.

I thought it was hilarious and wasn’t remotely worried that I was way over the line. One other guy chuckled but stifled it FAST. No one said anything to me and I was still nine months away from when I planned to quit, but I realized it was time to go. I just didn’t care anymore.

The next day I turned in my resignation paperwork.

On my last day, I was picked up by Tommy Batboy on the steps of the Corporate compound.

All I had with me was my plant.

Thanks to all the Ranger Up fans out there who have supported us for so long and here’s to all you entrepreneurs out there that keep this country hungry and strong.

While the bulk of this story comes from Crigger, when alcohol is involved we at Ranger Up like to infuse many perspectives to ensure a truthful recount.

For once this story isn’t about an act of incongruence by a member of Ranger Up. Instead it’s about an act of sheer stupidity enacted upon us by a vertically challenged apoplectic douchebag.

There we were, finishing up an average night of Rangeriffic partying in Vegas after UFC 114 at the Mandalay Bay’s Foundation Room with James McSweeney and MC Hammer when a little shit hit the fan. We were hungry, but the closest sustenance was 41 floors below us in the lobby. With our go-mugs in hand we stepped into the elevator along with a few other party goers when things went amuck.
I had not been paying attention much at this point, as I was enjoying the terrific buzz coursing through my body.

Reed’s Perspective

From my vantage point, the first exchange started when we piled into the elevator. Someone else said (maybe one of the girls) “are we all trying to fit in one elevator” and Lex said to no one in particular something like “yeah, it’s going to be a little scary.” (i.e. There were some big boys in the pack and it was going to be tight.)

Just as Lex had entered, then turned around to face front as the doors closed, Napoleon was already nose to nipple on Lex and says “Oh yeah? What’s gonna be scary? Who’s scared?” There was a lot of silence in between the first few comments, primarily due to the fact that no one realized who or why this guy kept speaking to an elevator full of strangers. On the 3rd or 4th comment he spit directly at Lex was when everyone in the elevator realized that some elevator midget tossing might be on the docket.

Moments before the Douchepocalypse.

Back to Crigger

Nick, chipper after a night of partying, casually says to the short, bald, Steve Austin wannabe, “It’s all good man. No need to be angry tonight! You’re going home with three girls.” Most people would have taken this at face value since his intent was to say, “lighten up dude.” But not this guy. He was chemically unbalanced and listed severely on the side of roid rage. If ever the term Napoleon Complex fit a small man, this was him…with a bottle of gay juice. And Nick had inadvertently just pushed his wee little button.

Due to imbibing on bourbon (and not really caring about anything other than my growling stomach) I must admit that I didn’t catch the next few words that were exchanged until Frodo Baggans (sans the hair) looked the hulkingly large Lex McMahon in the face and said, “You scared?”

That caught my attention. This runt had 235 pounds of Lex in front of him, Nick’s square 5’8” by 5’8” physique flanking him, and me (my nickname is Thor) behind him. Professional fighter Dale Hartt held the opposite flank while Reed Kuhn took notes for the eventual police report. Somewhere 40 floors up Matt Phinney’s spidey senses tingled (until his drunken brain told him it was a false alarm). In their hotel rooms Tommy Batboy and John Tackett felt a disturbance in the force, jumped out of bed, and loaded their Armageddon arsenals. In short, this guy was surrounded and facing his own personal Chosin…and Chesty Puller he wasn’t!

But there he stood talking shit. He had to look nearly straight up to see Lex as my hands slowly positioned for a rear naked choke in the case that he decided to strike. Nick snuck a leg in between his for a Judo throw as Dale Hartt pulled a ninja hood over his face. So props to this guy for not backing down. But the sheer insanity of the force he faced meant only one thing – he was a complete idiot.

“You don’t want this,” Lex said calmly. Still he pressed forward. His girlfriend stepped in between us. Still he jacked his jaw. The elevator door opened and I alerted security to avoid a massacre. Still he talked shit. What was it with this dude? Was he brain dead? Or was he the Andy Kauffman of pugilism? For a second I wanted to alert a special ed teacher that one of his students had wandered off without his helmet. But I thought better of it and for the most part we kept our cool and tried to walk past him to the nearest restaurant. Nick was getting bored and said, “we’re done here man, have a good night.”

Yes...these look like good guys to fight...

Dan Ostrower’s Perspective

I had taken the next elevator and was rushing to catch up to the guys. The door opens at the bottom and I am happy to find Nick standing by the entrance “waiting” for me with a new “friend”.

I notice the rest of the guys standing around the perimeter hanging out, a mini-strike force consisting of raw power (Krigger & Lex) a quick reactionary force (Dale)and my co-embed Reed keeping a watchful eye on the surroundings since I took a quick break upstairs.

I walk up to Nick, drink in hand, with a solid buzz and absolutely no clue what I was walking into. In other words- fat, drunk and stupid.

At this point I find myself standing side by side with Nick and a drunken Frodo Baggins look alike that I presume to be another facebook fan or friend that I haven’t yet met.

As the dialogue continues I notice said Hobbit becoming increasingly belligerent towards Nick, and Nick’s complete disregard for such animosity adding further fuel to the fire.

In light of Nicks complete and utter calm and the hilarity of the proposition, I continued to knock down my drink as we start walking towards the restaurant with the now increasingly irate Hobbit in tow.

With our chosen restaurant in sight and the Strike-force ready to get their feed on, Nick made a quick overture of reconciliation to end the ass-clownery from the Hobbit and hopefully call it night.

Nick’s Perspective

I want to eat. I have done nothing to this guy, have no idea why he wants to fight me, and don’t care. Eat then sleep. That’s my plan. I’m pretty much in Ranger School mode.

Baggins blocks my fucking path. “You think you can take me, don’t you?”

“Nope. I want nothing to do with this. You look like a tough dude.” I lied, giving him his eighteenth out of the night. “I’m really sorry for whatever it is I did. Have a great night.”

“Oh, you think you can leave that easily? You can’t,” the Hobbit adds, stroking his precious.

I’m done. I try to walk around him. He blocks my path.

I look at the bouncer. “Dude, do you see this?” He nods.

I take a step back. Baggins moves a step forward. I take another step back. No we’re cha-chaing.
My aggravation level is rising fast. I’m not 18 anymore, so I am perfectly willing to “back down” to the aggressor to not get in a fight, but an infantryman has his limits and after the military and 22 years in combat sports my instinct when I am met with aggression is to destroy.

I am fighting that instinct with everything I’ve got when Reed walks over to help out.

Reed’s Perspective

Thinking Nick must somehow not be getting the logic of the situation across to Frodo, I walk over and point out to the guy that he is really the only person there who wants to fight (since he kept repeating the same questions towards Nick and Lex : “You wanna go right here?”) He also continuously offered up mindless rhetoricals like “you think cause you’re big you can take me?” or “you think cause you got your boys you can take me?” Never liking to leave a question unanswered, at least three times I point out that if by some miracle he bested a thousand pounds of ex-military beefcake and 170 pounds of ex-military and professional fighter Dale Hartt, he would surely still spend the rest of the night in a hospital or a jail. “The only way you sleep in your bed tonight is to just leave them alone,” I emphasize. Amazingly, he perseveres. “I’ll fight anyone. I’ll fight everyone.”

Back to Crigger

Blah Blah Blah is all I heard Reed say. I was tired of this. We were all too weary (and yes, drunk) to lose our cool, especially knowing that once we did, the situation would get fugly at ludicrous speed. Nick stopped answering, but Baggins continued to close the distance between them. His girlfriend (the only voice of reason on the Hobbit’s side) got in between them and tried to defuse the situation, but Frodo stuck his hand past her and poked Nick.

“You only want to fight because you got all these guys with you.”

Oh no, you didn’t.

Nick suddenly had a crazy look in his eye. Troops and barn animals shudder at this gaze. “No…I want to fight you because you’re a fucking faggot!” he erupted.

Saw that one coming.

From this blog (and Facebook) you may only know Nick as a drunken rowdy when in reality he’s a professional guy with a cool head. But block his path, physically prod him, and accuse him of cowardice and the hyperlocks that keep him in check are off. Even a lethal cocktail of a Ritalin and Valium won’t stop his Italian blood from boiling over. If it weren’t for the uber bad security dude holding him back, Nick would have shined the Mandalay Bay’s floor with Napoleon’s pancreas (I prefer the spleen, but Nick’s still a little young). I give the security guy all the credit for avoiding a bloodsport because the rest of us would have merely watched. Dude deserved it.

Then Nick served up the ultimate insult. “Here’s my card,” he said. “When you sober up in the morning, if you still want to do this, call me. We’ll fight in a cage. Fair and square.”

I openly laughed. Lex heckled. Dale Hartt let out a “daaaaammmn.” The dude’s girlfriend stepped up and took Nick’s outstretched card and said, “you hunka hunka burning love.” It was epic. Only a challenge to have a dance-off would have been more hysterical. He had no recourse but to back away, but not before Nick reached over, shook Frodo’s hand, and delivered the backhanded coup de grace.

“Looking forward to your call.”

At that point there simply was no point in taking anything seriously.

Until ten minutes later when we stepped into Raffles diner and Tommy and Tackett crashed through the ceiling, rappelled to the ground, and violently aimed mini guns at everyone in the place screaming “Bad boys, bad boys..whatcha gonna do!” That’s when things got awkward.

I stood there in a teary-eyed haze as my palms added to the thunderous applause resonating through the theatre. Pride, sadness, revulsion, and raw amazement ran through me in a maelstrom of emotion. I had just encountered a work of art that moved me in a way I had never expected, and every soul in this packed auditorium at the 2010 GI Film Festival felt the same way.

I had just experienced Chosin. Chosin, a documentary chronicling the Korean War Battle at the Chosin reservoir, is the production debut of Marine Captain Brian Iglesias and Marine Captain Anton Sattler and the directorial debut for Iglesias. The entire magnificent film is created using first person accounts from the living survivors of the battle. To some of you, this concept may not seem extraordinary. I’ll be the first to admit I can sit in front of the history channel for hours and enjoy a documentary after documentary because I love the knowledge I glean, but this was a different experience. I was held rapt from the instant the title screen arrived until the moment I lurched to my feet to give these two gentlemen and the thirteen Chosin veterans they had flown across the country to the premiere the standing ovation they so rightfully deserved.

Every aspect of the film was spectacular, but what truly set it apart was the raw and honest nature of the comments from the Chosin veterans. Thirty-three minutes into the film I stopped myself from sobbing as a man that could easily be any of our grandfathers teared up as he described his experience. His perimeter had been overrun with Chinese as his battle buddy died in his arms from multiple bullet wounds. The incoming fire was so heavy that he instinctively placed his dead friend in front of him as a sand bag. You could see the pain in his eyes. You could imagine yourself in that situation. For an instant, you were almost there with the Chosin Few, as they often refer to themselves. You almost understood. An instant later you realized you could never understand, and you thanked God for it.

Brian talks to Ed Reeves while Anton films

Hollywood producers would never get this story. Thank God Iglesias and Sattler are not Hollywood producers. The two Marines, both two time-Iraq combat infantrymen, left active duty and transferred to the reserves with one solitary vision – they were going to tell the story of Chosin. They didn’t have money. They didn’t have connections. They simply had a mission and they refused to fail. The two rented a van, were given boxes of MREs from their units, and tracked down one-by-incredible-one the remaining Chosin survivors. For one year and two months they toiled, sleeping in the van every night unless a local VA was willing to give them some floor space for their sleeping bags, and met our forgotten heroes. When they ran out of money, they waited until their next drill and then went back to the road. At the end of it all they gathered more than 250 hours of video that they are preparing to donate to our national archives.

Hold Fast

The Chosin Few spoke to Iglesias and Sattler in a way they never would to others, because while the generations and the battlefields they served on were worlds apart, these heroes from the Chosin campaign saw in them combat infantrymen. Iglesias and Sattler were not simply interested in making a movie. They felt every single word, imagined every single round, could see every lost Marine, and wanted to honor the men who had come before them – the men that helped give the words United States Marine the meaning it rightly deserves today.

As the film comes to its two-hour conclusion, the men who have been telling their stories so graciously to us answer, one-by-one, the same question: how many did you lose out there? The answers come and with each response my heart sinks further: 17 out 235 men in combat infantry company returned, 35 out of 240 returned in the next, only five returned in a rifle platoon… Each man’s story was different, but yet horrifyingly similar. I sit and wonder whether I would even have the strength to live if I had lost 35 of my men as a platoon leader. My mind goes to Bill Maher, a soldier who was taken by an IED months after I left command of the mortar platoon. I feel the weight that loss still has on me, on all of us. I think about losing all but four of my men and what that would feel like. I know I am not strong enough. I know it.

There is a brief pause on screen. We hear Iglesias’s voice for the first and only time throughout the entire film, which is told entirely in the voices of the Chosin Few.

“Thank you”, he says.

Finally, someone said it.

Purchase Chosin here. Ranger Up believes so strongly in this film that all purchasers will receive a $5 gift certificate to Ranger Up with their DVD.

Join Chosin the Movie’s facebook page here!

Brian and Anton at the GI Film Festival

OH MY GOD! Is that an American Flag! KILL HIM!!!

America needs to collectively Ranger the Fuck Up.

I’m not sure when we decided that we have to be complete and total Cowardy McCowardsteins regarding anything and everything that might offend someone somewhere, but it has to stop. The premise is contrary to the very fabric of our Republic, it teaches people to avoid discussing topics of any significance for fear of sounding “unsympathetic”, and allows the weakest members of our society – those with no backbone or character of any kind – to garner power by out-PCing everyone else.

Why am I so angry?

Four kids from Live Oak High School in Morgan Hill of the People’s Republic of California were threatened with suspension for wearing shirts with American Flags on them on Cinco de Mayo.

Cinco De Fucking Mayo.

Cinco de Mayo is a holiday so insignificant that it is barely celebrated in Mexico. It is NOT, I repeat NOT Mexican Independence Day, which takes place on 15 September. It actually celebrates Mexico’s victory over French invaders on May 5, 1862. Ages ago, Americans and Mexicans acknowledged the day as a battle won together, as Mexico’s defeat of the French eliminated France’s interference in the American Civil War, and America’s munitions support to Mexico allowed them to defeat their invaders. Over time though, we’ve pretty much bastardized it into one big party…just like we have for Saint Patrick’s Day. And do you know what’s wrong with that? Nothing. It’s awesome. We throw one hell of a party here in America.

What is wrong, however, is when a self-important high school administrator takes it upon himself to decide that being patriotic, or hell, even being a dissenter of a cultural holiday is somehow cause for punishment.

Our founding fathers argued so bitterly over the tiniest aspects of our Constitution that they often sought to personally destroy each other. Hell, back in the day congressmen would get in fistfights, swear at each other, and even duel to the death over policy arguments. Now, suddenly, we can’t even wear different colored clothes lest we might perchance showcase an opinion that is different than the rest of the cattle?

People should be disgusted. People should be horrified. “Who does this administrator think he is?” is the question that we should be hearing over and over again. Why does he think he can infringe on our rights as Americans? Were these kids wearing shirts that said, “I hate Mexico”? Did the shirts have aggressive, hateful, or angry quotes on them that a reasonable person would consider harmful? Were the children themselves saying cruel things about Latin culture?

No. In fact, two of the freakin’ kids come from Latin backgrounds. So what is the problem?

“The shirts were incendiary”, the assistant principle argued. Ah yes, that American Flag – that’s some rough stuff. The kids might as well have been wearing KKK robes or perhaps pornographic images involving farm animals. Another student of Mexican descent offered that she “wouldn’t have worn a Mexican shirt on the Fourth of July”. Later the assistant principal would point to the fact that 100 students walked out of school in protest of the four “flag wearers”.

High school kids in California staged a 100 person walkout? Is that newsworthy? Seems to happen every day and also doubles as a convenient way to get out of school. Hell, I’d have walked out too if I was sixteen. Hell, I’d walk out tomorrow except Tommy would call me on it. As for the girl who wouldn’t wear the Mexican shirt – wear away, young lady! 1) Its America. You can. 2) No one will give a rat’s ass, because no one cares what you do.

Now a lot of people out there miss the point. They spend time arguing that the kids were unsympathetic and should have considered the feelings of the Mexican students. Nevermind that we live in America por uno momento. Their argument may be right. I think we’re all kidding ourselves if we didn’t think these four kids weren’t trying to poke a little bit. Oh. My. God. Teenagers trying to get a rise out of someone? I don’t believe it. Yeah, they may have been on a mission of annoyance that day, and that might not be cool, but who cares? Their actions weren’t illegal. They didn’t violate school policy. They sure as hell didn’t violate the constitution. Are we now going beyond that and trying to get rid of assholish behavior? If so, we at Ranger Up are in a lot of trouble.

I’ll be the first to admit that prior to this incident you wouldn’t have caught me dead on Cinco de Mayo with an American Flag shirt on. I’d be wearing a giant sombrero, a fake mustache, a poncho, and bandoleer full of shots. And you know what? As absurdly offensive as that should be, no one ever gives a shit, because this isn’t about anything meaningful.

This is yet another incident showcasing this bullshit faux-PC belief that we’re supposed to hate ourselves because we’ve kicked ass.

America is hugely successful. Immigrants, like my Italian dad and many of our Mexican neighbors to the south, came here because it is awesome. You can change your fortune in one generation. You are rewarded for hard work. You can say anything you wish. You can act in any manner you want so long as it doesn’t harm other people. You can be Christian, Jewish, Mormon, Scientologist, Atheist, whatever. If you’re a giant douchebag, you can even protest a military funeral.

All of that is good. All of that is the reason men and women, many immigrants themselves, have bled and died for generations to keep us free. Furthermore, immigration is good. I love that we have cultural influences from every corner of the Earth here. It’s one of the things that makes the U.S. of A so incredibly unique.

What isn’t good is our steady progression towards pretending every belief, every action, and every circumstance is okay. What isn’t good is pretending that taking a stand, even a flawed one, is a bad thing.

Kids should all have to be culturally sensitive at all times. Why? Adults aren’t. And guess what, some cultures have significantly inferior qualities. In many areas in Afghanistan, men routinely rape boys. In most cultures worldwide, women are not valued as equals. In Germany, they like David Hasselhoff.

If you can’t speak English, we’ll teach you in Spanish, or German, or French. Why? No allowance will be made for you once you are an adult. Shouldn’t you be challenged now while you can learn without consequence to adapt to the American culture? Isn’t that in your best interests?

We will do our best to prevent you from ever feeling pain – we’ll expel kids who fight, limit classes that make you feel stressed, and decrease the standard so everyone succeeds. Why? No one will cater to those whims in the adult world. No. One. Cares.

We are a country built on carving our destiny out of the wilderness, surmounting any obstacle that comes in our way, and fighting tirelessly for our beliefs, no matter the consequence. We need to stop fucking around. Argue politics. Get passionate. Call it like you see it without worrying what others will think. But most of all protect our rights. They are so rare in this world and we take them for granted. Don’t let this kind of nonsense fly. Whether those kids were heroes or zeros, they have every right to wear the colors of the United States of America on their person any day of the week , in any city, in any state.

I know this. I’m retiring the sombrero, mustache, poncho, and even my beloved shot bandoleer. Next Cinco de Mayo I am wearing a big ass American Flag on the front and Unapologetically American on the back.

And to the school administrator and anyone out there who is sticking up for this oxygen thief: You’ve just won a free vacation to Doucheraq, Douchebagistan’s sunny, but economically and rights-challenged neighbor to the South.

You never forget your first.

I was twelve the day I met my first Army Ranger. I remember it like it was yesterday. Twas a fine summer morn in Somerset, Massachusetts, the duck capital of the world…Okay, it may not actually be the duck capital of the world, but there are a lot of freaking ducks there to the point where there are actual DUCK CROSSING SIGNS. During winter, while kids in other towns made snowmen, we were forced to make snowducks. Hell, there was an even a bill to make a giant Trojan Duck that would rest at the town’s entrance. Anyway, for whatever reason, Somerset loved it some ducks. One duck in particular, a female creatively named “Quack” by the moms of the neighborhood, was a particular fan favorite as she would eat directly out of your hand and all but let you pet her.

When Quack was around the kids were happy, the moms were happy, and there was much rejoicing. And those duck crossing signs would keep our ducks safe…until that moment.

Quack, with ducklings in formation behind her, led the march across the street. Around the turn came a car with a teenager at the helm. He hit his breaks. The neighborhood held its breath as the car came to a stop.

Ducklings fled in all directions. All four were healthy and safe.

But alas, there was one victim.

My mom screamed out as she saw Quack on the warm, heartless pavement. Her chest and part of her neck were crushed, but the duck was still alive, making horrible clacking noises. Some of her guts were exposed. I wasn’t even a teenager yet and hadn’t been exposed to a whole lot of death, but I was pretty sure this was a done deal.

In less than two minutes, every man, woman, and child in the neighborhood was blocking traffic in a circle around quack. My next door neighbor yelled, “Someone needs to get help!”

That’s when Mr. Peterson ran over from across the street.

Mr. Peterson, also known as Major Peterson, had served on active duty for many years, both as an enlisted man and later as an officer. He was now in the National Guard and spent his military time as the National Guard liaison and cadre member to the Ranger Training Brigade. He was a big friendly bear of a man, and we just knew him as the guy that roughhoused with us.

As he busted through the throng of people, it was clear he was looking for the injured human. His sharp eyes quickly took in the situation and his posture changed rapidly when he realized the victim was…well…a duck.

“You have to help!” one woman pleaded.

Mr. Peterson, looked at her, nodded, and said, “No problem”. Everyone looked relieved. The Ranger was going to save the day. I wondered what kind of medical magic he was going to perform. Maybe some medical trick learned on some long lost battlefield that us mere civilians weren’t privy to.

He gently picked the duck up, placed one hand on the top of its head, while the other cradled its body at the base of its neck.

CRACK! CRACK!

With two quick movements, Mr. Peterson had violently and rapidly snapped the duck’s neck in two. It was out of its misery.

Instantly there was commotion. Some people yelled at him for killing it. One woman half struck him in tears. Mr. Peterson was incredulous. “What did you want me to do? Perform reconstructive chest surgery? It’s a duck!”

My neighbor looked at him with murderous intent, “It’s not a duck, Carl! It’s Quack!”
Mr. Peterson shook his head, grabbed the duck, and walked away.

Everyone left started crying…except for me and my brother.

It kind of Quacked us up.

Last night Jack saved the World again, and yet rumors abound that Fox is cancelling 24. Good call Fox. Maybe you can run more episodes of American Fucking Idol or Bones? I’ve never seen Bones, but after 24 the previews told me the two main characters are finally going to date…that’ll probably help ratings…after all it worked for Moonlighting…

Doth mine eyes deceive me or is he...aiming?!

Better yet, please run some more generic Lawyer, Cop, or Medical dramas. That would be fan-fucking-tastically original! Come on Fox! What else does this American Icon have to do to keep his show?!

Jack Bauer has been a staple of asskickery and military manliness since 9/11. In eight days and one fairly terrible two-hour movie, Jack has killed over 250 terrorists, tortured another 300, pulled a handful of Presidents asses out of the fire, saved the World a dozen times, lost his wife, lost his girlfriend, lost his next girlfriend, drove his most recent girlfriend virtually insane, been captured and tortured at least a baker’s dozen times, and had to rescue his dumbass daughter twice or thrice. Does he complain? No. He just Rangers the Fuck Up (Bauer is tabbed, as one would expect) over and over again.

This season, Jack was hung by his wrists, beaten, electrocuted, and stabbed. You know what happened next? He kicked the terrorist cocksucker in the face and triangle choked him from the air. That’s not only a 9 on the Badass Richter scale, it’s also an incredibly embarrassing way to die, and yet oddly plausible – what I like to call the Bauer Trifecta.

And this isn’t the first time Bauer has escaped from capture. Once when his torturer leaned in to whisper some tough guy sweet nothings into Bauer’s ear, he latched onto the assclown’s throat like a Vampire Pit Bull and spit his larynx across the room.

Jack will eat the fuck out of you if he has to...

You know what else Jack does? He realizes that sheet rock doesn’t stop bullets. He shoots dumb terrorists through walls. You know what that is? That’s outstanding is what that is.

Hey, I’m a woman terrorist. Jack can’t kill me! He’ll have to have his token female co-hero fight me or it won’t be fair and he’ll look bad!

Wrong, terrorist tartlet!

Jack Bauer is not sexist. He is an equal opportunity terrorist killer. You’ll never read this though, because you’re already dead. But he is currently wearing your face so he can pose as you and infiltrate another terrorist lair.

Wait for it…now they’re dead too…

Bottom line, Fox: For a decade Jack Bauer has kicked ass, taken names, and given us a hero willing to sacrifice anything to save the nation and defend the constitution. He was an island of creative terrorist destroying awesomeness in a sea of sappy emotional pap, canned jokes, and general unrestrained lameness and douchebaggery.

If you take him from us, Fox, and your only answer is Human Target, well…we’re probably gonna hate you.

And for those of you out there questioning Jack Bauer’s awesomeness and perhaps wondering why we’d allow a “fictional” character to be Hero of the Week, I leave you with this real life conversation with Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia at a conference in Ottawa, Canada:

During a panel discussion about terrorism, torture and the law, a Canadian judge remarked, “Thankfully, security agencies in all our countries do not subscribe to the mantra ‘What would Jack Bauer do?’ ”

“I don’t think so.”

No, sir, we would not. We’d have covered him while he moved.

Rhino Den, ATTENTION!

PRESENT ARMS!

ORDER ARMS!

Thank you, Mr. Bauer, for your distinguished service.

Jack Bauer’s Military Honors:

Combat Infantryman’s Badge

Kuwaiti Liberation Medal

Prologue

It was a miserable summer day in the mountains for Ranger Class 7-99. Just like most days, I was the Alpha Team Leader. We’d been moving uphill for the entire God-forsaken patrol and the blistering Georgia heat and stagnant humidity was sucking our collective will to live. Ranger “Smith”, a PFC from Ranger Regiment trying to earn his tab, was having another rough day. Smith had been recycled once already for failing patrols and this was his last shot before he’d be kicked out of Ranger School. He was a sharp kid, but he stressed out a lot when he was in charge, and didn’t have the greatest constitution despite his large stature, so he was often teetering on the brink of falling out. Regardless, he never quit, even when we could tell he was hurting and he improved every time, even though he wasn’t the strongest guy when it came to patrols. Frankly, we all liked him and were rooting for him.

At this point, Ranger School hadn’t really gotten to me. I had wrestled or fought since I was eleven years old so not eating wasn’t a big deal, and West Point taught me to operate on no sleep, so that wasn’t so bad either. When I saw Smith falling back, I pulled some ammo out of his ruck, traded his SAW for my M4, and helped him get up the hill. Over the course of the next month, I remember doing this at least three times. After all, teamwork was one of the key components of Ranger School. It is with that spirit that Ranger Up hit the Bataan Death March.

Our Latest Dumb Adventure

Kelly Bruno is a bad ass

500 meters into the race one of Tommy’s Camelbacks busted, draining water down his back into his boots. This was very funny at the time.

We took the first drink of Wild Turkey around Mile 1. I believe this helped with energy.

We took the second drink of Wild Turkey around Mile 3. All the better.

My bottle of Maker’s garnered many comments sticking proudly out of the back of my ruck. Outstanding.

By Mile 5 we were moving along nicely and at a great clip. All was good with the world. We passed the Wild Turkey on to passersby. They were happy to meet Ben Franklin’s recommendation for the National Bird.

Then something happened. We were going uphill and it wasn’t ending. Mile 8. Still uphill. Mile 10. Still uphill. There literally was no respite as we continued to climb a 6% grade. My hamstring, which I tore break dancing at a wedding, was starting to cramp. Goddamit. Something in the body chemistry was lacking. I hammered back some Gatorade and ate some Gu and hoped for the best.

Tommy noticed my gait was off and asked if I was okay. In my younger years I would have pretended nothing was wrong. Having just turned 33 the day before (yeah, Happy Birthday to me) and having been on both sides of this coin in the past I told him exactly what was up. “We need to slow down?” he asked. “Nah, man. I should be good,” I gamely replied.

Tommy knew I was hurting, but also knew there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot he could do, so he nodded. When we hit Mile 12, the desert sun had sucked me pretty freaking dry, my leg was killing me, and I had a slight case of the fuzzies. Not ideal. Kelly Bruno, along with the freak of nature that is The Dave (he has a racing stripe tattooed to his leg…seriously), were basically running laps around us for fun because they are weirdos designed by God to do things that are truly miserable and somehow enjoy it. I kind of hated them.

That’s when Tackett looked at me and said, “Dude, you are completely covered in salt. That can’t be good.” Tom and Whitney looked at me like I was on my death bed. I was hurting pretty bad, but didn’t fully grasp how much salt I had shed until Kelly Bruno told me I looked like “a salt encrusted tuna”. I punched her in the face…in my head…but thought it was real…and that’s when you know things are going south.

Tackett told me to watch his feet and stay with him. In retrospect this would have been a good time to give some of my 55 pounds to someone carrying 20 less, but of course, the idea never occurred to me. The next mile and a half was a festering bag of dog shit. I was pissed off that my body was crapping out. I was frustrated as I knew that this was the outlier – I could do this race 20 times and only have this happen once, but BAM there it was. Most of all though, I was in pain: my hamstring felt like it was tearing all over again, I had a splitting headache, and I was cramping up. I adopted the old Ranger School standby of just putting one foot in front of the other and following Tackett. Life sucked.

Finally we got to the 13.5 mile mark where there was a water refill point. I had the fuzzies something fierce. “I’m way low on electrolytes,” I stated. Suddenly, I realized my team must have knocked off a CVS drug store before starting this race because there were about 107 pills suddenly in my hand. I vaguely remember them all blathering on about calcium delivery systems, electrolytes, and caffeine, but in all honesty they could have given me a vial of crack cocaine, two Viagra, and Iocane Powder and I would have downed every bit of that shit. With God knows what now swimming through my system, I refilled the camel backs (why was I still Muling at this point?), rucked up, took a pull of Wild Turkey, and moved out.

At this point I was expecting to be in for a miserable second half of the race, but with the amphetamines, opium, and paint thinner that my team had given me I started to feel way better – strong even. With every mile, I increased my pace with my proud Ranger Buddy John Tackett right beside me. Things were looking so good in fact that in my newfound exuberance we did mile 18 in just over ten minutes – a blistering pace with the 55 pound rucks. I was good to go now – fully revived. Nothing could go wrong!

That’s when Tackett broke his foot.

We were running on a downhill and something popped. At first he suffered through it without slowing, but his face had definitely changed. I knew where we were heading. Shortly thereafter he was turning his foot so that he wasn’t putting pressure on the injury. Now it was his turn to dig in. He took a nice pull of Wild Turkey as he grimaced on.

I looked around at the rest of the team. Tommy still looked strong. Whitney’s face showed some nice misery, but she was kicking ass. Kelly and The Dave had picked up juggling pins along the way and were throwing the pins back and forth to each other over our heads as they frolicked. I still hated them, and I am pretty sure John did too, mostly because he told me he did.

At mile 21 we hit what Bataaners affectionately call “The Sand Pit”. While much of the course is off road, up until this point the sand had been packed pretty well. The Sand Pit, however, was a foot to a foot and a half of loose sand. You couldn’t help but sink into it, which was just awesome six hours into a race, especially if you had a broken foot.

A mile and a half later, we were through. Whitney looked worse, but still good to go. Kelly and The Dave had somehow added a poodle to their juggling act. Tackett was hunkered down into miserable Ranger mode. Tommy, however, had gone from looking strong to looking ghost white.

“All my blisters popped dude.”

That water that had seemed so funny at 500 meters, had turned Tommy’s feet to hamburger (later the nurse would ask him if she could take a picture of his feet) and all of his blisters had gone at once. The spring in his step was gone. We Rangered on.

At Mile 23 it was Whitney’s turn to fall back a little. She looked bad and I was worried about her. By Mile 24.5 she was slipping back a little further. We slowed our pace to check on her and she motioned to keep moving. We did, but we kept a watchful eye. By Mile 25 she was really slipping back. Tommy turned to walk towards her when all of a sudden she let out some sort of Ginger grunt and took off running. She ran past us and we called for her, but she didn’t stop or slow. She just ran the ugliest run we had ever seen and disappeared. The Dave and Kelly were doing cartwheels while riding unicycles. We all still hated them.

Our group limped on to Mile 26. Whitney the Ginger was waiting there. She screamed something unintelligible and we, as a group turned the corner. There were two tenths of a mile to go. John, broken foot and all, started running. We all ran with him.

Team Ranger Up finished the God-forsaken race as a team in what can only be described as a day when everything that could possibly go wrong went wrong. Murphy had his way with us and kicked us out without even asking for our phone number. We were hurt and a bit disappointed. We all knew we could have done a lot better. I personally felt very guilty for slowing us down for a few miles in the middle stretch. It sucked.

We opened the bottle of Maker’s Mark that I had carried carefully on our excursion and pretty much killed it inside of ten minutes.

Right about that time we found out that we beat the old record by one hour and twenty minutes. About forty minutes later, the second place team, sponsored by Crossfit, would finish. We were well into our cooler of beer by that point.

Full Circle

Ranger Smith made it through the Mountain Phase and was now with me in the final phase of Ranger School in the swamps of Florida. There were about 96 hours left in the school and I already had a GO. All I had to do was physically make it to the end and I was going to have the coveted Ranger Tab. Life was as good as it could be. Ranger Smith was doing okay. We still helped him a lot, but he was continuing to improve. I hoped he was going to pass.

We had a miserable patrol that night and my Ranger Buddy had been in rough shape. I took his guard shift and sat on a rock in order to keep from getting comfortable and stay awake. When the shift was over and I went to move, I fell to the ground. I couldn’t feel my leg. At first I thought that I had just cut off the blood supply and that my leg would wake up, like when you fall asleep on your arm, but after thirty minutes there was no improvement. I couldn’t even walk without tripping. My mind raced. How the hell was I going to make any of the movements? The worst started entering my mind – I was going to fail Ranger School this close to the end. My eyes actually welled up.

Fuck that. I was going to figure this out. After several attempts, I realized that if I turned my foot sideways, I could lock it out and use it almost like a crutch. I spent much of the morning mastering this walking technique as I knew we had a long movement that evening.

Evening came quickly and we moved out. I did well for a while, but try as I might, I started slipping back. The Ranger Instructor was right in my face. “Do you want to quit Ranger?”

“No sergeant,” I said with disdain.

“It looks like you want to quit, Ranger.”

“Fuck that, sergeant.”

This took him aback because generally students, myself included, were extremely subservient to RIs. I was in a bad place and didn’t care anymore so anger got the better of me.

“Ranger, if you fall back too far, you’re done,” he snarled.

I put everything I had into moving forward. I pushed so hard off of that bad leg that to this day I still have knee pain from that night, but even with that effort, I knew I was in a losing battle. We had a long way to go.

Suddenly, I felt a hand under my ruck. At first I thought it was the RI pulling me out and my heart sunk but then I realized it was Ranger Smith, pushing me forward. Pride forced me to tell him I was fine. For the first time that any of us had ever seen, Ranger Smith got fierce. He leaned in and said, “You don’t have to do everything yourself Nick. You’re sucking and you’re getting my fucking help whether you want it or not. We’re a fucking team. Keep walking.”

I shut the fuck up. Ranger Smith got me to the end of the movement. That night I got some feeling back in the leg. I graduated Ranger School a week later. Ranger Smith was there with me.

Epilogue

As we walked through the chute at the end of the Bataan Death March, we shook the hands of the veterans who had lived through the real event in the Philippines. During the real Death March there were no water stations, no electrolyte pills, no support of any kind. If they fell out they were bayoneted on the side of the road and left to die. When they did stop for brief rests they were tortured. These men had nothing in the world except for two things: their indomitable will to survive and their buddies to their left and right. And they did it.

The race was awful in every conceivable way. And it damn well should have been.

God Bless the Battling Bastards of Bataan!

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Ranger Up President Nick Palmisciano announced today that wages will be raised by 1.4% in 2010.

Ranger Up, the premier military apparel company in the United States, announced today that despite massive growth in 2009, wages would only be raised 1.4% in 2010, mirroring the proposed Armed Forces wage increase.

Many employees, including COO Tom Amenta, was shocked at company president Nick Palmisciano’s announcement. “It’s insane,” reports Amenta, “All year Nick was promising that if we buckled down, improved our operations, and stopped taking martini lunches, the company would be in great shape. Well, we did that. We got rid of our Tilt-a-Whirl, Ball Crawl, and Petting Zoo, and created a surplus, and you know what that hooker and blow addict did with the money? He gave it all to the dudes that run Absolutely Incompetent Guys T-shirt Company across the street. Those assholes threw a drunken go-kart party and we didn’t even get invited. What the hell’s up with that?”

Palmisciano, was quick to defend his actions, explaining that Amenta didn’t understand all the intricacies of what was going on, especially because “Tommy” was notorious for spending roughly two hours a day “combing his hair” in the bathroom. “Look, if AIG T-shirt goes under, that could affect our shirt supplier. If they don’t ship as many t-shirts, our costs could go up, and we may have to fire someone. By my count I just saved at least four jobs. Trust me, it may seem like a bad decision given the fact that Ranger Up employees routinely work 80 hour weeks, have four job titles each, and sleep on cots in the boiler room while the AIG guys enjoy gourmet lunches, BMWs, and office parties filled with local college hotties, all while being completely oblivious to the fact that their business continues to fail, but trust me, this time it will work differently.”

“They literally are burning money,” Amenta retorted. “They don’t know how to use the thermostat, so they burn money to stay warm. This is not going to end well for us.”

When pressed further on why it would work differently, Palmisciano clasped this writer’s shoulder and explained “Because I said so.”

Amenta wasn’t the only employee to topple Palmisciano’s straw man logic. Warehouse manager Whitney Post also had concerns with the new development. “Nick bought one of those lists of potential customers from every piece-of-shit, third world country known to man and handed it to me with a big box of money. He told me to just start mailing it out,” exclaimed Post. “When I asked him why, he told me that as a company, we needed to build international good will. I retorted that there might be a contradiction between selling a shirt with ‘Douchebagistan’ on it and sending the denizens of that country $20 bills, but he just responded, ‘I love Lamp’. What the hell do I do with that?”

Amenta agreed, “Whitney is already handling shipping and customer service – now in addition to fighting those two wars, she has to deal with this humanitarian crap! 1.4% just doesn’t cut it for that much work – I don’t care what is happening in other companies!”

But while donations to other companies and countries are serious employee concerns, perhaps the biggest issue Ranger Up is having in the New Year is its new health care plan, which oddly only offers wart removal, fungal inspections, and tourniquets. Garrett Schemmel, the CMO complained, “Nick has decided to “scrap” big names like Blue Cross and United Health Care for Ranger Up Health. The dude seriously just spent thousands of dollars installing a clinic in the back of the warehouse with a Filipino voodoo specialist, a gallon of Robitussin, and a giant box of 800mg Motrin capsules that’s labeled ‘Ranger Candy’. After it was built, we realized that we didn’t have the kind of money to staff, you know, a giant fucking hospital, so we took out a loan, putting what was a profitable company into hock. Even with that, all we could pick up was a couple of retired Candy Stripers, so we’re putting Kelly Crigger through medical school. The company is now stretched thin, our healthcare is at the whims of the incompetent, and Crigger is walking around in a candy striper uniform and heels. Disturbing.”

“I want to introduce him to Helga the five knuckled proctologist,” offered Crigger as he threw his rubber doctor’s hammer at Palmisciano’s command photo. “I’m a professional writer and a Lieutenant Colonel. I’m sure as shit not checking Amenta’s balls once a year!”

Amenta agreed, “No one touches my balls but me!”

“That’s what she said,” offered Post.

So do these recent developments mean the end of Ranger Up? “Nah,”mumbles Amenta, “I love this job too much and I think it’s too important. I mean, yeah, it’d be nice if Nick appreciated how hard we worked, got his nails dirty, and put himself in our shoes every once in a while instead of embracing the limelight and worrying about magazine covers and which UFC star he was hanging out with, but at the end of the day, I don’t do it for him. I do it for the guys we ship to.”

After a quiet pause, Post added, “Yeah, but you know…fuck 1.4%”

Schemmel nodded., “Yeah fuck it right in the ear. That shit won’t even cover my higher tax rate.”

And Ranger Up marches on.